We had been to Willa's favorite "soda" – a tiny
diner on the beach in this gritty tourist town.I chose a big Sunday breakfast – pork chop, "gallo pinto"
(rice and beans), tortilla.We spoke
with the owner as we sipped our cafes con leche, asking about his mother, an octogenarian
who would still be running the place if life were up to her.

The breakfasts were huge, and the remains of mine were soon
resting in the requisite styrofoam container.Next stop was Mass; I really hadn't counted on walking in with food to
go.But I also was fixated on how good
that chop would taste later in the day.

Between the diner and the church there is a lovely fountain
surrounded by small palms and other tropical plants.It looks like my image of the biblical wells
where women came to fill jars with water and share news.It also has one of the few drinking fountains
in town.I realized how thirsty I was,
and drank deeply.

As I stepped back to give Willa her turn, I noticed movement
in the shadows of the plants behind the fountain. All I could see were eyes, and a smile, like
the Cheshire Cat. The form took shape
and words emerged from the deep foliage; despite my surprise I greeted the man
behind the smile. Then he said,

"Can you give me something to eat?"

There was no hiding the styrofoam container; it shone bright
white with heat and presence.I looked
at Willa, gulped, and walked the around the well to hand it over.The young man stepped out of the vegetation,
looking like many of the young men who get washed up on the shore of life every
morning here.

He thanked me, and apologized – I'm not sure for what:For being poor and hungry?For taking my leftovers?For being in a position of having to beg for
food?As we walked on toward church, my primary
feeling was shame.That I had been
afraid of him.That I had to think about
it - I didn't want to let go of my leftovers.That they were not even my first-overs, but the scraps from my table.And that I did not have a fork to offer him a
shred of dignity when he ate them.

I thought that was my spiritual shake-up moment for the day,
but God is never done with me that easily.
We arrived at church during the readings, and I heard
from 1Cor 4:

"Brothers and sisters:

Thus should one regard us: as
servants of Christ

and stewards of the mysteries
of God.

...

for he will bring to light
what is hidden in darkness

and will manifest the motives
of our hearts..."

"Steward of the mysteries
of God" – I felt like that, handing over my food, as the man hidden in
darkness walked out to lay my motives and heart in the bright sunlight.

The readings continued on to Matthew 6:

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what
you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more
than clothing?

Look at the birds of the
air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly
Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?And can any of you by worrying add a single
hour to your span of life? . . .

Therefore do not worry,
saying, “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?
. . .

...your heavenly Father
knows that you need all these things.But
strive first for the kingdom of God and his
righteousness, and all these things will be given
to you as well.

. . . So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring
worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today."

I have been worrying about a lot of tomorrows in the past
year.Yet I find myself in a lovely
place with extra food in my hand.I meet
Jesus coming out of the palm fronds, asking me (Jesus asking me!) for
food.Usually I am the one asking,
begging, from God.

The
priest used the readings to underscore the community's need to care for one
another.This town, like most in our
world now, has a few people walking down the street with money to burn in their
pockets, many others working hard to keep their heads above water, and countless
others who are close to losing the struggle with the waves that crash
over them.

The
world is so out of balance, and tipping more than ever the last few weeks. I have no illusion that my small act can
begin to rebalance the world. But it was
what I could do today. I hope I eased
his hunger for a bit – God knows he fed me.
Yet still, I am thirsty.

I was in the middle of trumpet practice when I got the
news.After playing a string of high
notes I never could have hit in high school, I glanced through my email and saw
words I had long expected and dreaded:

Mr. Roina died.

I envy those of you who can call him "Ed."More than four decades later, this teachers'
kid still cannot use that level of familiarity.Perhaps Paula, another teacher's kid, will understand.But her dad inspired that mixture of both
familiarity and respect.In the avalanche
of comments on Facebook, I've seen everything from "he turned my life
around" to people who got to interact with him on a frequent and familiar
level.

Ted Kennedy famously eulogized, "My brother need not be
idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life."I have tried not to let my memories run away
with the real Ed Roina, yet it is hard not to idealize a man, a teacher, who
touched so many lives, and who lived a life we might not believe if it were
written as fiction.To understand what I
mean, read the excellent piece "And His Band Played On" by Jannette
Jauregui, published in the Santa Paula Times 12/03/03.

Some teachers put up with us.Some liked us.Some loathed us.I think that Ed Roina truly loved us.I know he was harder on some than on others,
and that some of us drove him crazy.But
my experience was that he was fair and respectful to all.Along with family and church, band was where
I learned the things that formed the core of who I am, my best self.I learned to work as a group, and especially
in marching band I saw how individuals working together can create a whole that
is efficient and beautiful.

Besides music, I learned discipline, responsibility, and
adaptation.I remember Mr. Roina's story
about playing tuba to qualify for a position (perhaps the Navy band?) and
seeing a low note approaching that he knew his instrument could not hit.When the note arrived, he sang it (I can hear
his rich basso voice) and moved on.He
got the position.Years later as a very
young marching band student, I was lining up for the parade route when he
noticed my red socks.I had proudly
chosen them, thinking they coordinated well with the uniform.I learned about regulation uniforms when,
after an exasperated sigh, he traded his darker socks for mine – explaining
that the judges might deduct less points than if they saw them on me.

I look back at band as the great melting pot of grade
school, junior high, and high school.It
was the class that saved my life and sanity all through school.During years when I felt out of place
everywhere, I "belonged" in band. All of us:"soshes", jocks, brains, nerds, the quiet, the unseen, the
unclean, all the castes of our adolescent society – we became one and we all
"belonged" in band.

I was never the strongest or most talented player, and I
should have practiced way more than I did.But I know that I looked forward to band every day, and the time passed
way too quickly.I started out at 11
years old on trombone; after an initial mild double-take ("You want to
play trombone?") he became my musical mentor for life.

There are always things we wish someone had done, or not
done – I wish he had encouraged me to continue music in college; and I wish he
had not praised Sandra King's talent in a twist when I initially thought he was
talking about mine (Sandy, do you know how much he admired your playing?)I waited three years with the hope of being
first trombone my senior year, and was disappointed to not be chosen. I learned
to overcome disappointment, to always keep playing, and that every player is
integral to the group.He recognized
that plodding determination when, much to my surprise, he called my name as the
Eva Walden music award recipient.And I
thought he was talking about Sandy in his lead up to the award.

The gifts he gave me will never end. He started a jazz band
when I was in high school.I never heard
this music in my home and I never quite "got" it.But he kept letting me play.Thirty years later I was playing trumpet in a
jazz band that performed in local venues, and I was "getting" it and
loving it.I continue to play in the
local community band.

I've just agreed to play in a Veterans' Day parade, and that
reminded me of a Veterans' Day at the Santa Paula cemetery, playing "My
Buddy" and seeing grown men weep as they listened.I was learning the power of music, but I had
no idea what that song meant to Mr. Roina until reading Jannette's
article.He was the kind of man and
teacher whose death inspires tears from former students 51 years after their
first lesson.

As I read the obituary and the many comments from former
students, I remembered he was also an art teacher, but I was stunned by the
depth and breadth of his talent, of his life before Santa Paula.There was also mention of the church we both
attended.I recalled how I dreaded Lent
– first because it was Lent, but especially because Mr. Roina would give up his
pipe.Oh, those were dark days.I don't know if all the broken batons happened
during Lent, but I remember we could all breathe easier after those 40 days of
edginess.He did change my life. He taught me to play and to appreciate music, one of the passions of my life. He provided a safe, challenging, exciting place to be every day.

He
allowed this painfully shy person to interact with classmates I otherwise would
never have known.I'm astounded to think
I got up in front of all my peer musicians and earned my SP letter for
conducting.Only through his teaching,
guidance, and support were so many things possible for me then, and now.

When my brother Joe died in 2001, I was back in Santa Paula
at my mother's home, waiting for the funeral.I knew I needed something to ease the grief and the waiting, and I went
up the hill to the high school.There,
in a band room new to me, Ed and Barbara Roina greeted me warmly and offered
condolences.Then Mr. Roina rummaged
around in the back, found an ancient trumpet, and invited me to sit in for
practice.The bewildered trumpet players
couldn't know what that meant to me, but Mr. Roina certainly knew the power of
music in the face of grief.

So when I heard of his death, I turned to music, and
listened through the Fauré Requiem.Surely Mr. Roina was familiar with those soaring melodies, particularly
the movement "In Paradisum", with its text from the Catholic Order of
Burial.Those are the words of farewell
I pray for him now:

"May the angels
lead you into paradise . . .

may the chorus of angels receive you . . .

may you
have eternal rest."

Thanks, Ed, and Godspeed.

This article was originally published in the Santa Paula Times, October 25, 2013

Oh, there's
the communal prayer on Sundays, which is important, and the meal prayers
through the day with my Sweetie.There
are the brief fits of prayer – the Anne Lamott-type prayers of "Help me
Help me Help me!" and "Thank you thank you thank you!". But I have strayed once again from the regular
prayers that I wish could be like breathing – done always and every day.And when I do include them in my daily routine,
they ARE like breathing: refreshing, sustaining, life-giving. When I let them
go, I wander, I flounder, I sink.

So I sat this
morning, for the first time in too long a time, to read something, anything,
that would pique my spirit; and to be still, and to spiritually breathe.The closest reading at hand was
"Listen" – a publication of Spiritual Directors International.The front page is always a short
meditation."Good, this won't take
long," my inner impatient self unconsciously assured me.I was anxious to get on to other things that
provide parts of my life, but which my heart knows are not as life giving as the
breath of prayer.

I read Pegge
Erkeneff's words in "Listen", trying honestly to listen, and came to
the full stop of her suggested reflection:"Pause and be still.Listen
to your heart beat.What sensations,
emotions, feelings, or thoughts are you present to, within your own body and
skin, here and now?"Seems so
simple, yet there is a world of possibility here.

"Pause and be still."

I felt the
discomfort of the chair.I moved my
hands and arms around, trying to assume a posture of peace, and quiet, and
stillness.I was distracted by objects
on the table.My spiritual kindergartner
was hard at work, trying to make stillness.I tried breathing exercises, and moved into trumpet breathing exercises,
which brought up all the music I've practiced lately.But it did finally calm me down enough to
move to the next step.Interesting how
stillness can lead to movement, and vice versa...

"Listen to your heart beat."

I tried.I tried to hear or feel it, just sitting in
the stillness.I could imagine I heard
it, because I know my body, I know my heart, and I can replicate it's beat
after all these years of listening to it.But today, nothing.I put my hand
on my chest.Nothing.I put my left hand on my right one, to help
in the search.Not much – perhaps an
imagined thread, a feeble cry from somewhere deep inside.I tried for a pulse.Faint, and sleepy.

Granted, I had just
gotten out of bed in the wee hours of the morning, but this felt like something
beyond sleepy heart.This was a heart
trying to get me to wake up, and it was glad I was finally paying
attention.This was a heart begging me
to attend.To it.To life.To sit still and listen and hear the beat.

"What sensations, emotions, feelings, or
thoughts are you present to, within your own body and skin, here and now?"

First I felt sad for
my own heart, trying to get my attention.But crashing all around me and unshakable is the global bad news.I had been to cnn.com too often, and read too
many stories of mall shootings, school shootings, army base, navy yard, homes,
churches, mosques, synagogues.I knew
this sadness was beyond my own individual heart.This was the world's heart trying to get my
attention.But there must be feelings
beyond sad and scared.Otherwise we will
all curl up in a fetal ball and whimper, of no use to ourselves, others, the
earth, or God.

What can one heart
do?

Maryknoll Sister Ita Ford wrote to her niece "I hope you come to find
that which gives life a deep meaning for you...something worth living for,
maybe even worth dying for...something that energizes you, enthuses you,
enables you to keep moving ahead."

For most of us, that will not be as dramatic as it was for
Ita Ford and the other church women killed in El Salvador many years ago
now.But it can be a guide for all of us
– the search for that which gives life, even (especially) in the midst of so
much death and sadness and lack of cooperative spirit.I do find things that energize and enthuse
me, and I am doing them.Now how do I
transform them to be life-giving for those around me?That's my question for myself today.

And I rise from my sitting to see the sun rising quite
brilliantly, glancing off the clouds and transforming them to gold.I will go out into my ordinary day, which, as
always, has the potential to be quite extraordinary.It's all in the heartbeat.